We rented a little car and did a small loop around the North Island these last few days. Here I am at Rotorua, famous for hot springs and geothermal pools. The stink of sulfur was almost unbearable.

This is likely to be the highlight of the North Island for us. We hiked 21.5 km up, over, around and down volcanoes. This volcano behind us was "Mt Doom" in the Lord of the Rings movies. We didn't go up it (just the base) but we climbed to the summit of the nearby Mt Tongariro, from which this photo was taken. The whole hike took us 6.75 hours - the longest hike we've done -rewarding the best views. The dark spot in the snow on the volcano in the background is from the last eruption - 2 months ago.